Ultimate Tele tone!

[mrfjones]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

i am still interested in finding jimmy pages tone. I know part of it is the 15" speaker he was using, but i really know nothing else about that tele. I assume it was ash with like lew said a tele pickup with staggared magnets. Anyone else know anything about it?

Thanks for all the information in this thread Lew. I appreciate the testing you are doing and it is very helpful. I may have to try that jd in this tele thats just sitting around here.

I will throw another thing into the mix here and say that the tele that is being made for me is going to have a voodoo 50's broadcaster style pickup with A5 magnets. I should recieve the pickup today but the only thing i will do with it is read the resistance off the tag or box. I am not going to test it until the guitar it is going into is finished. It should be over 9.5k so this one will be hot. I thought i would try one since i had heard mostly good things about peter florance and his pickups. I also want a tele that can really get a big sound. anyone have any comments on this one? tried one?

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

Lew-

In case you haven't done this already, here's a comment on my Blues Special Neck paired with the JD bridge: To me, both pickups are very focused and with both activated, I am able to hear the effects of each pickup as if they were played in unison on 2 different guitars through the same amp. I wasn't able to achieve that with the other neck pickups I"ve tried with the JD, or with other guitars (teles) for that matter. Maybe my buddies Anderson could but that was a while ago since I played it...

So, they're very articulate and complement each other very well with cleans and certainly under a bit of gain, they're fantastic.

I think my holy grail is throwing a blend pot in my Tele with these pickups. Anyone got the parts/schematic?

My James Burton Tele is the one I have the JD in and I do use the Fralin Blues Special neck pickup with it. The balance is just about perfect. So you want a blend pot? You'd have to install a second volume control...one for each pickup. That'd be the way to achieve that. Or if you wanted to retain the two control look, you'd have to sacrifice your tone control and just go with two volume controls. Lew

 

[Hellion]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

Right: but all of those guys used differant Tele with differant style bridge pickups probably with differant magnets and raised vs flat polepieces.

Don Rich and Albert Collins definately used Teles with raised pole pieces for a brighter, twangier lead pickup tone.

Roy Buchanan and Danny Gatton both used '53 Teles with flat poled "Broadcaster" style lead pickups...tho Danny switched to the Bardens.

From thier tones, I don't think either Danny or Roy had the a2 style 51/52 Tele lead pickups like Jerry Donahue has in his 52 and I had in my 51...thier tone is brighter and more ice picky and not as quacky.

Albert Lee I'm not sure about, but I think his Tele is a later 50's one (1954 or later)...probably with the raised a5 polepieces like the lead pickup in Don Rich's, Jame's Burton's, Steve Cropper's and Jimmy Page's Teles.

Lew

Yea, but the thing is, they're ALL Tele tones. It's like Strats: I think of Stevie & Jimmy Vaughn as well as Yngvie Malmsteen, Richie Blackmore, Eldon Shamblin, Buddy Guy, Hendrix and Clapton. Tele's to me sound like a Strat on steroids, or a Stratocaster with hair on his chest. The tone's beefier. My Strat, played through the same system as my Tele (and I know I'm going to anger some Strat allies here, but I played them too for years) sounds breathier and not quite as up front as my Tele. It's just a different sound. The best description I've ever heard between Tele's & Strat's is that Tele's punch & sing and Strat's sting & scream. To me, it's not about the differences in pickups. Albert Lee doesn't even use a Tele anymore, he's got that bastardized Ernie Ball model (so what? he still makes it sound amazing).

 

[Hellion]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

i am still interested in finding jimmy pages tone. I know part of it is the 15" speaker he was using, but i really know nothing else about that tele. I assume it was ash with like lew said a tele pickup with staggared magnets. Anyone else know anything about it?

Thanks for all the information in this thread Lew. I appreciate the testing you are doing and it is very helpful. I may have to try that jd in this tele thats just sitting around here.

I will throw another thing into the mix here and say that the tele that is being made for me is going to have a voodoo 50's broadcaster style pickup with A5 magnets. I should recieve the pickup today but the only thing i will do with it is read the resistance off the tag or box. I am not going to test it until the guitar it is going into is finished. It should be over 9.5k so this one will be hot. I thought i would try one since i had heard mostly good things about peter florance and his pickups. I also want a tele that can really get a big sound. anyone have any comments on this one? tried one?

Page's thing was really about mic placement. That solo in "Stairway to Heaven"? Pure Tele, but it still sounds like a Paul to me. Remember, a lot of players back in that time didn't have the luxury of swapping out parts. They just used what they had. Page, I think, is one of the last great innovators of mic placement, right up there with Tom Dowd (Allman Bros) and Andy Johns (also Led Zeppelin).

 

[mrfjones]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

Page's thing was really about mic placement. That solo in "Stairway to Heaven"? Pure Tele, but it still sounds like a Paul to me. Remember, a lot of players back in that time didn't have the luxury of swapping out parts. They just used what they had. Page, I think, is one of the last great innovators of mic placement, right up there with Tom Dowd (Allman Bros) and Andy Johns (also Led Zeppelin).

I am working with two guitars to try and find the tone he could get out of that tele, I know that the poles were staggared and the 15" speaker left a lot of different places the mic could be placed so i guess the only real questions i have left are how hot these pickups have to be to acheive that sound. I don't think they were much over 7 k if even that.

I wish i had the touch like page had, that would let me use the stock pickups and get a great sound, but i don't have that and these pickups in my sunburst tele are really bad. I don't know what fender switched in the classic tele pickups but the pickups out of my other tele were pretty good. Maybe i just need to listen to some more zeppelin and i might figure out how to get closer to that tone. Any other help would be appreciated though and thanks Hellion for the mic positioning, i really hadn't though about that.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

I can get a pretty good approximation of the tones on the first Led Zep album with my '54 Tele, a Boss DS-1 on about 1/2, and one or two of my late 50's 5E3 tweed Deluxes with a mid 60's Celestion 12 silver Bulldog. It's not exact and I don't play anything note for note anymore...but it's pretty close. And alot of fun! Lew

 

[mrfjones]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

hhhmmmmm do you still have the blues specials in that tele lew? I know i have the gain from the amp but i think a clean boost would help a little before the preamp so i can hit it pretty hard right up front.

I am not looking for an exact sound but one thats pretty close, cause i don't like sounding like everyone else but some of those sounds are cool tones to put into other applications too.

Thanks Guys.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

I do have the full set of Blues Specials in that '54 Tele...they have the most output of any of the pickups I've been testing, but they don't have the out put of a humbucker or anything like that. Just a strong, clear but ballsy tone.

The NoCasters are in the Custom Shop 53 Tele and the Jerry Donahue lead and Blues Special neck are in the James Burton Tele.

I'm having a hard time deciding which Tele to put the Duncan Antiquitys in! All three of the Teles just sound so great (and so differant!) right now with the pickups that are in them.

Lew

 

[Curly]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

well, then ... time for a new tele!

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

well, then ... time for a new tele!

It's true! The NoCaster lead pickup is my least favorite, but I'm not ready to remove it. It's the only guitar I own that's stock!

Lew

 

[mrfjones]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

hahahaha, then curly was right, time for another one.

 

[blake da teleman]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

does anyone 1 know what the five-two sounds like, im quite curious.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

does anyone 1 know what the five-two sounds like, im quite curious.

Supposedly, it sounds bright, deep and twangy on the three wound strings and more like the Alnico Pro II or JD on the three wound strings. Lew

 

[blake da teleman]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

it seems like it whould sound quite intresting,...does anyone own this pickup?

 

[Falstaff]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

it seems like it whould sound quite intresting,...does anyone own this pickup?

I had them in a Strat and didn't love them...a bit too polite for me. But that's the Strat; maybe the Tele is different.

 

[blake da teleman]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

whould u rather reckomend the JD pup? whould the JD be able to play rock and blues?

 

[Falstaff]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

whould u rather reckomend the JD pup? whould the JD be able to play rock and blues?

Now that I can say for sure...yes, I would have to say the JD is one of the most versatile tele pickups that can still be called a true tele pickup. If that makes any sense. You can get sufficient twang with a bunch of other options as well.

 

[italic zero]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

What about the Five-Two neck vs. AII pro neck?

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

Well, this search is coming to an end I think, now that I've installed the Duncan Antiquity Tele pickups in my James Burton Tele.

The Antiquity Tele bridge pickup is superb!

Reminds me very much of Roy Buchanan's tone, even more so than the NoCasters. It's bright but not so ice picky bright and the mids are mallable and shapeable like the Jerry Donahue, but more textured and not quite as smooth.

The highs have a certain grainy complexity that is very appealing to me and the overall tone is lively to the extreme. Maybe the livliest Tele lead pickup of the bunch.

The Antiquity Tele lead and Jerry Donahue are my two favorite vintage style Tele lead pickups.

The JD has thicker mids and more quack and the Antiquity is brighter, more complex and more textured.

The Fralin Blues Special Tele lead is deeper, fatter and smoother than either, but lacks the sassy squawk/quack and personality of the Duncans.

Those are my three faves and the three I will keep in my three Teles. #4 would be the NoCaster Lead...but I only have three Teles so that one will have to make way, even tho it too is a great pickup.

Now for Tele neck pickups! So far, I prefer the Fralin Blues Special for an uncovered neck pickup and the Fender NoCaster for a covered Tele neck pickup.

The Antiquity and AIIPro sound similar: very warm and full but not quite as bright or as much output as a Strat neck pickup. The tone of a vintage Strat neck pickup is what I'm after, and so far the Blues Special is the closest, followed by the NoCaster.

Lew

 

[JumpMarine]

Re: Ultimate Tele tone!

Here's a track I had done from a session a couple of years ago, using the Jerry Donahue Bridge PU. The cleaner twangier rhythm track and solo at the end were using that PU on my 82 Tele.

Link to Tele using the Jerry Donahue bridge pickup - country track

Here's another slammin track I did for the movie Mission: Impossible II. This one used the same pickup for the main lead melody line, but had all the treble rolled off.

Link to Tele using the Donahue bridge pickup - Heavy/Alt style music

Pretty versatile if ya ask me...

Great tunes, could you explain the set up used for the MI2 music?